Christmas Q&A with…Jennifer Gilby Roberts

I’m a wife, mother of an almost-three-year-old and chick lit author living in north east England, who doesn’t understand fashion and is a bit clumsy. I like reading regency romances and memoirs (especially for mid-20th-century nurses for some reason), watching crime dramas, acting, zumba and Dungeons & Dragons. I eat too much chocolate.

2) What do you love about Christmas?

Mince pies, Christmas songs, advent calendars and seeing my sister and her family (they’re the only ones in the immediate family who don’t live nearby and we don’t see them nearly enough).

3) What do you hate about Christmas?

It’s not cheap! My husband’s family is very large, so we have to save all year for it.

4) What is your favourite Christmas book?

Not actually a Christmas book, but I like the tales of Christmas in the Little House series. Making each other presents and being thrilled with one piece of candy – a bit different from today!

5) What is your favourite Christmas song?

‘All I Want for Christmas is You’ by Mariah Carey

6) What was your best Christmas?

One year I came home on 23 December after four months out of the country. It was the first time I’d been away from my family for longer than a fortnight (I was 17) and I appreciated them a whole lot more for it!

7) What was your best Christmas present?

My Kindle (even though I thought I didn’t want one).

8) What was your worst Christmas present?

One year for the office secret santa, we each had to choose a colour and an adjective as well as a name. The person buying for me got ‘blue’ and ‘alcoholic’ – but I don’t drink.

I don’t think I’ve ever had a really bad present. I remember my dad once bought my mum a bug-zapper for their anniversary (“It was what she was most concerned about at the time”), but my husband knows better!

9) Describe your ideal Christmas

I’d like to take my daughter to Lapland when she’s older, so she can meet Santa. If that doesn’t get you into the Christmas spirit, I don’t think anything will. I’d also rather like to do a Disneyland Christmas, which I admit would be as much for me as for her.

10) What do you want for Christmas this year?

Alexander McCall Smith’s version of Jane Austen’s Emma, some new clothes and a pair of Shape Ups (on the off-chance they actually work).